Up until about a month ago, White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon appeared to be the most powerful person in the U.S. government, second only to President Donald J. Trump. Bannon’s right-wing, nationalist, anti-immigration, anti-establishment influence seemed apparent in everything coming out of the White House, from Trump’s hastily written travel ban to his harsh rhetoric toward China and Mexico, Trump’s borderline antagonistic attitude toward NATO, and his appointment of agency heads seemingly designed to dismantle the agencies they were tasked with leading (looking at you, Scott Pruitt, Betsy DeVos, Rick Perry, Ben Carson). The media was captivated by Bannon’s Svengali-like mystique—his propensity to quote obscure fascist philosophers; his dark, apocalyptic intimations of a coming clash of civilizations; his grandiose pledge to begin the “deconstruction of the administrative state.” Time magazine put a brooding photo of Bannon on its cover next to the headline, “The Great Manipulator.”

Over the last few weeks, however, things have begun to shift. Bannon was removed from the National Security Council, a move that was widely viewed as a demotion for the former Breitbart executive. He has reportedly clashed with the president’s moderate son-in-law, Jared Kushner, setting up an intra-West Wing civil war that Bannon and his right-wing acolytes appear to be losing. Amid swirling rumors that Bannon was on the outs and that Trump was considering a staff shake-up, the president refused to say if he still backs his chief strategist, commenting only that while he “like[s] Steve,” you “have to remember he was not involved in [the] campaign until very late.” He may as well have thrown him out the cabin door of Air Force One. Meanwhile, the president appears to have reversed his stance on a variety of issues, breaking with Bannon on everything from NATO (actually, it’s no longer obsolete) to China (not currency manipulators, after all).

This shift has been attributed primarily to Kushner, Ivanka Trump, and the other New York establishmentarians who seem ascendant these days, including former Goldman Sachs president Gary Cohn and former Goldman Sachs partner Dina Powell, who was recently installed on the N.S.C. But members of the Close Personal Friends of Lloyd Blankfein club aren’t the only finance people pulling Trump away from Bannonism. Private-equity guru Stephen Schwarzman, who chairs the president’s Strategic and Policy Forum, is apparently also playing a growing role, according to Politico:

The C.E.O. of Blackstone Group, who has known Trump for years, has become so close to the president that the two sometimes talk several times a week, covering everything from Chinese trade to tax policy to immigration. White House and New York business officials say Schwarzman was critical to Trump keeping the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, also known as the Dreamers program, with Trump making the decision after a call with the hedge-fund billionaire. The two also recently chatted at Mar-a-Lago about a possible reorganization of the White House, two people familiar with the meeting say, though the conversation didn't include specific names.

Schwarzman's growing influence in Trump's circle is welcome news to New York business leaders and moderate Republicans, who want the president to abandon his nationalist positions and embrace a more nonideological White House amid lagging poll ratings and infighting dominating the West Wing. In private conversations, a number of Trump's friends have told him he could be more popular—and accomplish more—if he embraced a moderate streak and listened to his business friends. Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law, is trying to orchestrate more power for New York business types, particularly National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, while diminishing the power of chief strategist Steve Bannon, who drives the populist wing of the White House.

One executive in regular contact with West Wing officials said it’s encouraging that Trump appears to be embracing more pragmatic allies. “It seems like he’s relying now on nonideological people like Gary who have business experience and just know how to execute and get stuff done,” the executive said.

It’s not clear where this path leads. As Politico notes, embracing a White House delegation whose policies run counter to nearly everything Trump ran on carries the risk of alienating his base, which thought they were electing a guy who would put “America first” while telling the rest of the world to go f--k itself. Nor are Democrats suddenly going to embrace the p---ygate president just because he managed to get himself captured by Wall Street. Considering the only part of this job he‘s appeared to enjoy so far, aside from pretending to drive a big-rig, is his rallies, it wouldn’t be surprising to see him return to ranting and raving against globalist elites just as soon as the media glow from his newfound respectability wears off.

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Wall Street fear gauge spikes on that whole “mother of all bombs” situation

Wait, you mean dropping enormous bombs on Afghanistan and stoking tensions with North Korea doesn’t put people’s minds at ease? Per CNBC:

The CBOE Volatility Index (.VIX), considered the best gauge of fear in the market, closed above its 200-day moving average for the first time since the election this week. The indicator jumped more than 2 percent Thursday afternoon at one point to a fresh high for the year. . . The recent spike in fear comes just as geopolitical risk heats up. The Pentagon said Thursday U.S. military forces dropped the largest non-nuclear bomb in Afghanistan, the first time the so-called mother of all bombs has ever been used in combat. U.S. stocks fell, with the S&P 500 and Dow Jones industrial average on pace to close at two-month lows Thursday. . . Meanwhile, tensions around North Korea are heating up as the communist state has warned of a nuclear attack on the U.S., which has sent a Navy strike group toward the western Pacific. North Korea celebrates the birth of its founder Kim Il Sung on Saturday.

Trump’s deportation plans will cost billions

Even as Trump has fallen under the spell of the West Wing moderates, he’s shown no indication of backing away from his immigration crackdown. Part of the president’s argument for evicting nonviolent undocumented immigrants is that they’re a drag on the economy (an argument that, by the way, has been debunked). So if it’s money we‘re talking about, perhaps someone should tell him just how much taxpayers will be forced to pay to kick these people out of the country. Per CNN Money:

During fiscal 2016, ICE spent $3.2 billion to identify, arrest, detain and remove undocumented immigrants, according to the Department of Homeland Security. ICE handled some 240,000 of the roughly 450,000 total deportations that took place last year. (Customs and Border Patrol was responsible for the rest. It also arrests and deports undocumented immigrants, but mainly as they try to enter the U.S.) Each deportation conducted by ICE cost taxpayers an average of $10,854 in fiscal 2016, an official from the agency told CNNMoney. This amount includes everything from housing and feeding a detainee to transporting him back to his home country . . . Trump has said he wants to deport two to three million criminal undocumented immigrants. While it's unclear where he got that figure from, achieving his goal won't come cheap.

United Airlines has a very big lawsuit coming its way

Dr. David Dao, the passenger who was reportedly left with a concussion, broken nose, and missing teeth after being dragged from a United flight Sunday night when he wouldn’t give up his seat, intends to sue the airline, according to his lawyer. “If you're going to eject a passenger, under no circumstances can it be done with unreasonable force or violence. That's the law,” attorney Thomas Demetrio said Thursday. Let this be a lesson to any other corporate giants considering having the police assault their customers.

Is this why Donald Trump orders his steak well done?

Among the many things that Donald Trump has said and done in his 70 years, one of the most offensive is his penchant for ordering steak well done, an issue that people on both sides of the aisle can surely agree is indefensible. Why ask a cow to sacrifice its life when you could just eat a hockey puck instead? But we digress. Today brings news that, while it doesn’t excuse Trump’s actions, may shed light on his thinking. Per Reuters:

Undercooled meat, potentially dangerous raw fish, and broken coolers were among 13 violations found by restaurant inspectors at Mar-a-Lago, the exclusive Florida resort owned by President Donald Trump, during visits in late January, state officials said on Thursday. Mar-a-Lago representatives did not respond to requests for comment on the problems discovered at the private club, which charges $200,000 in initiation fees and has been dubbed the Southern White House . . . The Florida Division of Hotels and Restaurants said three of the violations were deemed “high priority,” meaning they could lead to illness-causing bacteria being served in meals. It said they were corrected immediately and the property's three kitchens brought into compliance before its inspectors left.

The Mar-a-Lago visit was routine and not prompted by any complaint, said Stephen Lawson, spokesman for the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation, which oversees the hotels and restaurants division. The inspections took place on January 26 and 27, just days before the state visit of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. The worst violations included the failure to use proper parasite destruction on fish intended to be served raw or undercooked.